The present invention relates to a showcase in which a display room is provided over an insulating wall; a machine room containing a compressor and the like is provided under the insulating wall; a cooling room is provided in the insulating wall; and an evaporator and a cooling fan of a cooling unit are installed in the cooling room so that cold air heat-exchanged with the evaporator is circulated in the display room by the cooling fan.
In a conventional showcase of this kind, left, right, and rear transparent walls and a front transparent door (transparent wall) are attached to supporting columns standing at four corners of an insulating wall so that a display room surrounded by the transparent walls is provided over the insulating wall. In the insulating wall, a cooling room is provided in which an evaporator and a cooling fan of a cooling unit are disposed. Under the insulating wall, there is provided a machine room in which a compressor, a condenser and the like disposed. By operating the compressor and the like, the evaporator exerts a cooling function and the cooling fan serves to eject cold air from one side of the insulating wall and suck the cold air from the other side of the insulating wall. The cold air is thereby circulated into the display room to cool the interior of the display room to a predetermined temperature (e.g., see Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. hei 5-203332).
In such a showcase, to make the interior of the display room larger, the height of a portion lower than the insulating wall is set to be small in comparison with the entire height of the showcase. As a result, only the cooling fan is provided in the cooling room in the insulating wall, and a fan motor for revolving the cooling fan is provided on the top wall of the machine room.
In such a construction, a hole for attaching the fan motor is formed in the bottom surface of the insulating wall so as to correspond to the attachment position of the fan motor. The hole is closed with an insulating material as in the case of the insulating wall. Through the insulating material, a through hole is formed so that a rotating shaft of the fan motor extending from the machine room side to the cooling room side can pass through the through hole. The fan motor disposed in the machine room is fixed to the top wall of the machine room, that is, a top plate of the machine room via a motor attachment plate. The cooling fan disposed in the cooling room is fixed to the rotating shaft from the cooling room side.
In the cooling room, a fan case is disposed in which a grill is formed around the cooling fan. Thus, when the cooling fan is operated, cold air captured by the fan case is ejected into the display room, whereby the cold air is circulated.
In the above construction, however, the fan case is only disposed in the cooling room. Therefore, there is a problem that the position of the fan case is easily shifted. When the fan case is shifted from its appropriate position, it becomes difficult to stably control the wind quantity of cold air to be ejected into the display room, which leads to a problem that cold air cannot appropriately be circulated in the display room. In addition, since the fan case is not stably be provided, the fan case might vibrate in the operation of the fan motor. Hence, there is a problem that an abnormal noise such as vibration noise is generated.
For the resolution of the above problems, it can be contrived that the fan case is fixedly provided in the cooling room. However, the cooling fan motor is attached to the top plate of the machine room, but the sufficient height of the machine room cannot be ensured. Hence, there is a problem that operation to attach and detach the fan motor from the machine room cannot be carried out.
More specifically, in a case where the cooling fan motor is attached and detached for maintenance or the like, it is required that the fan case is first removed, the cooling fan is then detached from the rotating shaft, and the insulating material which closes the hole formed through the bottom surface of the insulating wall is detached therefrom. Afterward, the motor attachment plate having the exposed fan motor attached thereon is detached from the top plate of the machine room from the cooling room side, whereby the cooling fan motor is detached from the machine room.
Therefore, to attach and detach the cooling fan motor disposed in the machine room from the cooling room side, the fan case has to be removable from the cooling room. Hence, it is difficult to stably control the wind quantity as described above.
Further, the attaching and detaching works for the cooling fan motor involve a work of disassembling a plurality of parts. In particular, since the hole and the insulating material are treated by waterproof caulking in order to watertightly compartmentalize the machine room and the cooling room in which dews are produced, the troublesome work is required.